Green Tips

Squeeze The Petroleum Out Of Your Food

Growing and distributing food the conventional way consumes vast amounts of petroleum in the production of fertilizers, the packaging, cool storage, and transport. Fresh fruit and vegetables can travel thousands of miles to reach us. According to Steven L. Hopp, in the book Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, If every U.S. citizen ate just one meal a week (any meal) composed of locally and organically raised meats and produce, we would reduce our country's oil consumption by over 1.1 million barrels of oil every week. Thats not gallons, but barrels.

There are a lot of local alternatives. Visit your local farmer's market, buy at smaller markets that carry local merchandise, like Fancifull. Many of the large grocery stores don’t because it is inconvenient for them to buy from sources other than the huge industrial agricultural companies (who receive huge subsidies to grow inorganically, but that is another topic), or you can check out CSA - Community Supported Agriculture. You can buy a part of what a farm produces and they will deliver a box of local vegetables every week. You can go to http://www.csacenter.org to get more information in your area.

If you are in the Hollywood area, we have teamed up with Tierra Miguel farms to be a drop off point for their produce. You subscribe through them, they will drop off a box of fresh produce at our shop on Melrose every week for you to pick up. We don't take or make any money from this. We want to support the local economy and the environment. The Tierra Miguel Farm website is www.tierramiguelfarm.org or you can contact Shoshana at 760.743.4213 or csa@tierramiguelfarm.org.